Bon Iver

"I just knew that what I was doing was extremely honest. It was all the things I wanted my music to be."

Lifted from a wintertime greeting on "Northern Exposure", "Bon Iver" first served as the salutation for a thank-you letter to Kelly Crisp of the Rosebuds before it was the adopted name of Justin Vernon's music project. Triggered by a bout of illness and break-ups with both his girlfriend and his band, Vernon's retreat to the seclusion of a Wisconsin cabin yielded an album's worth of material, the fabulous folk-pop record For Emma, Forever Ago . While his personalization tendencies may make him a landlord's worst nightmare (he likes to scrawl lyrics and quotes on his walls), Vernon has bowed out of the renting game and bought himself a bungalow in his home-state of Wisconsin. That acquisition provides enough fodder to fill us in on his personal code of conduct, couch-surfing past, favorite quotes, and just how much his heart belongs to the Copper State. Vernon also took time to explain just what a record means to him, address the TV on the Radio comparisons, and even briefly venture into the land of Rumours ...Fleetwood Mac's that is.

Pitchfork: You're speaking with an English accent-- is that what I'm hearing?

Pitchfork: He's scouting a movie and he's just made a video about a feud he has going with a community newspaper [during the process]. You have to check it out.

JV: Awesome.

Pitchfork: Are you going to be able to eat tonight?

JV: I think so. I'm not sure.

Pitchfork: Is it hard for you when you come into cities and don't have time and have friends in the cities?

JV: Yeah. For instance I just got word from a friend of mine-- Paul Kincaid. I haven't seen him in a couple years. Friend from high school. He's such an awesome dude, but I don't know how I'm going to see him and spend any quality time with him. We got in after a ten hour drive after sleeping for four hours. I'm not complaining here. I'm really not complaining. Ten hour drive to get here, we unload, we sound check, we get here we take photos, we do this. I haven't eaten anything today. It's like... And I'm not even hungry.

Pitchfork: Do you think it's because you're sick?

JV: Yeah. Probably. I just haven't eaten as much this week. I don't know man. I'm happy. I couldn't be anywhere else right now. Sometimes you complain. You bitch and moan a little bit, but there's no where else I'd rather be and like here I am. The thing that really does bum me out is like Portland; I'm here and I can't be here. I can't like go out and be in Portland. I can't stay at my friend's house because I had to have my passport sent.

Pitchfork: I wanna talk about that. What all happened? Did it get lost? Did it get stolen?

JV: It was stolen from the back room at the Parish. It was a day party, the NPR party. I even had a great day besides that, but like I put it down, I hid it. My guess is someone in there saw me and as soon as I left the room, grabbed it and left. It was like $300, passport, my driver's license, my credit cards, the band credit card, my molded ear-plugs, my nice earphones, polaroids of me and my girlfriend. You know what I mean? Man, it was like my whole life in my fannypack. I shouldn't have taken it off, but...so that was kind of a bummer.

But I was kinda of like, "You know what, I'm having a really good time." We were having good shows for the most part. People were enjoying what we're doing. A lot of my friends who I don't see very often were down there from North Carolina. It was a good week.

I [did] get really sick afterwards. "South by" is a too many people for me probably. It's a very intimidating atmosphere for me.

Pitchfork: Just the amount of people there, or the amount of people doing music?

JV: The amount of people that I feel like... I'm not being self-demeaning, but I actually feel like I'm not as cool as them, you know what I mean? And I don't have like whatever, so I'm just like, "Oh man, I'm just going to try to stay out of most people's way and get a taco and enjoy myself as much as I can," because it's such a beautiful town. Beautiful weather. I called my dad that day to tell him what was going on with my passport and he was like, "Yeah it snowed four inches today. It's ten degrees outside." I'm just like, "Cool. I'm glad I'm in Austin, no matter what."

Pitchfork: How did you come to be in North Carolina?

JV: My friends and I, my bandmates and I, we all moved to Raleigh.

We looked at a map and we were like, "We need to go somewhere. We need to have an adventure." New York was too much and Chicago's kind of too close with too much of an intimidation factor. California's too far away. So it's kind of like the Colorado area or the Carolinas. Heard so much about the Carolinas, Colorado seemed kinda snowy. We'd grown up with snow. We loved it, but we wanted to get away from it. We moved down there and then instantly sort of like were wedged in with this great social circle. Chapel Hill, Durham is kind of this big conglomeration. It still is and when I went down and played the 506 in Chapel Hill and just saw these people that I spent... I spent a year or so there, a year and a half maybe tops before I got sick and then I left and the whole thing, but it's so great down there; the people are holding it together.

It just felt like home when we went there. There weren't a ton of people from Raleigh. Matter of fact I only had one or two friends that were from the area. Everyone was from Michigan, Iowa, Wisconsin, Philadelphia. It was this weird hub of people. It was incredible. I love it down there.

Pitchfork: Do you see yourself moving out of Wisconsin anytime in the near future?

JV: I can't see myself-- I'm not really looking so far ahead in the future. I know that I kind of need to live in the country even though I'm not-- my house isn't in the country right now. I bought a house, like a really tiny, cheap house in Wisconsin.

Pitchfork: What's "cheap" there?

JV: Really cheap-- like $70,000.

Pitchfork: Oh that's good!

JV: So my mortgage is less than half of people's rent. It's this little tiny bungalow, like 80 yards from where I was born and down the street from the bar where my parents met. It's super comfy, but I'm never there. I can't necessarily see myself there forever.

My girlfriend and I have talked about moving to the Yukon or the west coast. I've dreamt about being [in Portland] before, but as life sort of shrinks and you get older, I don't know if I'm going to have time to do all the things and be all the places as I want to be. Wisconsin's really sacred for me, so no matter what happens, where I end up permanently living, I'll be spending weeks and weeks at least of the year, no matter how many years I live, in the northwestern Wisconsin area.

Pitchfork: Of all the things you want to do or wanted to do, is traveling something that you're able to do?

JV: Moving is what the deal is. I wish I could spend more time in places, but I find I either want to be in a place for an afternoon or like 10 days or a month. I don't like the two-day thing, so I just wish the drives were shorter so you could wake up, take a walk, and spend three hours in one part of the town. I always thought there should be 28 or 30 hours in a day-- you know what I mean? Like last night in San Francisco, we were there for six hours and I just would have loved to have gone to Golden Gate [Park] and just took a nap or something. You know what I mean? I haven't figured out how to do that. Maybe later we can get a sleeper van and just skip hotels.

Pitchfork: I'm thinking Fleetwood Mac-- you getting your own jet.

JV: Right! [ laughter ] I don't see that happening necessarily this decade.

Pitchfork: I feel that way with weeks, with people that have [dead end] day jobs. Five days on, two days off-- that is not enough.

JV: It's beyond crazy. It is weird. It's how some people are. I could never do it. Pitchfork: When was the last time you did a day job?

JV: I was in North Carolina and I was working in a kitchen. It really truly did suck the soul out of me. I was angry. I was a grill person and it angered me. Every moment I was in there I felt I was defacing my destiny or something. Like I was disrupting the time-space continuum by being in that kitchen because I was so out of place. I wasn't doing anything with my hands that I wanted to be doing. I would have anxiety so bad about it. I started out 40 hours a week there and I dwindled down to eight by the end of the year. I was just living off eight hours a week and then I got really sick. I think I contracted my disease--

Pitchfork: Pneumonia?

JV: It was pneumonia and mono and then I had this liver infection as a part of the mono. I don't know where else I would've got it except from there, washing dishes. I remember quitting: I was just like, "I'm going to be in bed for three months, I can't come into work." And they were like, "alright," and I never went back. That's the last time I ever really had a job. It's been over a year or so.

Pitchfork: Obviously your music is taking off, but is it a personal conviction to never go back and do that?

JV: Never, never. And I told myself I never wanted to rent again. Even though it's a battle, I'm lucky cause I'm living in a cheaper part of the country. I just told myself I'm never going to do this again. I'm never gonna work, I'm never going to pay somebody rent again. I'm never going to sign another lease at least. So for about 18 months I didn't have an apartment. I was crashing and I was moving around and I was going up to my dad's cabin and I was sleeping on the Rosebuds' couch in North Carolina for three or four months, but it paid off. All you have to do is just change your life. It was really difficult and kind of painstaking and whatever during the moment, but right now I look back and like, "Dude, of course you did that. You needed to do that to get where you are now or whatever."

Pitchfork: With the renting versus owning, is it feeling like you're throwing away money or is it the security aspect?

JV: I want to be able to write on my walls. I think that's the big thing.

Pitchfork: Do you write on your walls?

JV: Yeah.

Pitchfork: What do you write?

JV: I don't know, it's dorky. Just like quotes and stuff. Something I want to see everyday or something I want to be there. I don't know. I can put a hole in the wall if I want. It's mine. It's very simple. It's a very tiny house, but I can do whatever I want to. I can rip up the terrible vinyl floor and recycle it. Just create a good space. A quiet place to be. I think that's all I want in life, just like peace and be able to make music and like have happiness when it's time off. Spend time with people and family, whatever. I just feel like why spend all my time doing something that makes me unhappy just to spend my time off thinking about how I have to go back to a job. It's such a vicious cycle that people get stuck in. But I'm also very lucky. I can't sit here too eagerly and say all that.

Pitchfork: So what are some of your favorite quotes?

JV: Oh man, I don't know. I'd have to think about it, but I was listening to this Johnny Cash song today that Tom Waits wrote for him-- I think that's the story. For some reason it's a thing that sticks in my brain. He's describing this scene where he sees all these almost biblical images happening kind of in this burrow where this biblical train runs through this yard. The song goes, "I saw Judas Iscariot carrying John Wilkes Booth down there by the train" and for some reason when Johnny Cash is singing that...

I have that written out. I thought that was an image I had to put in my pocket and keep with me. I'm not exactly sure why. It's not that I need to remember it, because I won't forget those kind of things, but I just want to write them down and look at them. It's almost like when things like music come out and you're listening to a song and you have experiences with art or phenomena that supersede your simple relationship with them as just a piece of art. They're more than that. That's just what those quote are for me. They're big, they're important.

Pitchfork: So what are some songs that you have those feelings and reactions with?

JV: You put me on the spot. If I can just think about it. I mean songs that sort of... I don't know, every year it changes, you know what I mean? And sometimes it's not lyrics, it's just like motion of a song or whatever, but "The Horses" by Rickie Lee Jones, that's [a] very important song to me. Like any Steve Reich. The Collections of Colonies of Bees-- that's a band I always talk about, but listening to their music is like super religious for me in the way that I feel that whatever torrent they're creating with their music, I really just want to be in it. There's energy within the thing that's beyond just listening to it on a disc, something more than that.

Pitchfork: Were you really aware of that when you were doing your album?

JV: I think I've always been aware of it with my music. I think growing up basically and having a lot to deal with and just slowing down and having something to say and something to retract from, I think I just knew that what I was doing was extremely honest. It was all the things I wanted my music to be, but yet it wasn't grand and it wasn't obtuse-- it wasn't overshooting, it wasn't undershooting, it was precise. The lyrics and the way that I was able to extract and excavate emotion within me

I'm super happy to see the record doing its thing and for people to like it, but for me, I had a great victory just as a person. I overstepped countless obstacles by creating that record. And the record's a metaphor for the personal steps I [took] throughout the past year.

Pitchfork: When did you decide to self-release it?

JV: I think subconsciously or selfishly I knew that I was supposed to do something. It was like a thumping or a throbbing saying, "Yes, this what you've been waiting for." But you're a little dim to those spiritual thoughts when you're dumb like me. So I did have to get a little bit of a kick. I played it for a bunch of people and I think their reactions were warm and deep enough that they gave me the courage to get [the record] out there.

Ever since then, I've been trying to catch up to it. Just trying to get with it, feel behind it a little bit, but that's good actually, probably. That way, I'm still sort of understanding it. If I completely understood what was going on and I understood these songs, they wouldn't make sense to play live anymore. They're still enigmatic for me. I'm still searching in the songs as they are. That's what's actually been the most fun about playing and touring for me is that there's still a lot of caverns in the songs where you can go and hide out different nights. Some songs, some nights won't do anything for you, but people enjoy them and that's the job. The magic is finding those places to stand in the song and gain perspective.

Pitchfork: With people enjoying them, are people's reactions even putting a new layer?

JV: I just understand... I mean this may sound kind of bigheaded, bullheaded, or cumbersome, but when people say they've had a really deep experience with the record, like it caused a divorce or it like...I've gotten all these stories.

Pitchfork: Wow-- have you gotten that story?

JV: Yeah, or it was played for somebody's dying parent. Like there's this crazy e-mail from a guy in Scandinavia who said the first time he heard it, he dropped to the floor and wept. Like all these intense things that you read and you're like, "Holy shit. I'm not responsible for that."

I know that the record is responsible for that. I'm not responsible for that. I think there's a difference, without being too dissociative. But when I hear those things, the one thing I'm not is surprised. I am surprised by all the success-- that I'm surprised with-- but the way I felt when I was making it and the way that I felt when I'd finished it and when I was looking at it, I did down-deep know that is was going to do things like that. I just knew that. It's like, "Yes. This makes sense to me."

Pitchfork: And that comes around so rarely in life.

JV: Right and that's why I'm kind of like, "Am I gonna die this year?"

I was very sad and very lonely and now my family's doing really well and I'm in love. What happens now? I've done things that I've never dreamt of doing and I've kind of ran out of goals. So I'm kind of super happy, waiting for some shoe to drop. Whether it's the cover of Rolling Stone or just like peter off and work in a field for the rest of my life or just die. I'm that on the crest of everyday, it's like, "Wow, this is amazing. I'm happy everyday."

Pitchfork: Have you recorded the next one and you're listening to it now or are you going to be recording it?

JV: I'm going to be recording it. I have a lot of ideas.

Pitchfork: Is this level of happiness now influencing what you might explore, or are you going to take time to step back from it and get more perspective? Is it weird going into this next one having kind of accomplished what you set out to do without setting out to do it?

JV: I know what you mean. I don't think it's very... I could be worried about it if I had the wrong attitude. I don't think that I want my life and my daily occurrences to influence the direction. I don't want my daily life or my happiness to be a direct influence on music or my sadness. I think what's interesting about the way that this last record was made-- and I'm not going to repeat it or anything-- but it was music and creativity that led me to the emotion that I needed to express, whether it was joy or whatever and so I have ideas for music. that's my knack, or that's firing in my brain. The other way around was always too direct and it always ended up sounding like some B-grade Bruce Springsteen.

The weird thing is I feel like I'm shedding skin so fast and I'm growing and I'm becoming a new person so quickly at a rate that I'm comfortable with, yet it seems faster and more steady than an other time in my life except 16, 17, 18. I just have to sit down and listen to the ideas I'm having. And I'm not worried. A lot of people are like, "How are you going to re-do it?" I'm not worried about what people are going to say because you know people are gonna be like, "It doesn't sound like this... It sounds like this." I'm just going to make music that I know I'm supposed to make.

Pitchfork: Are you aware of the TV on the Radio comparison?

JV: Yeah, I've heard that.

Pitchfork: What do you feel about that?

JV: I don't feel anything about it. I really like "Staring at the Sun"-- I like that song a lot. I haven't heard a lot of their records, but I know that they're cool. I know that the people who listen to them are really awesome and I like those people, so I know that I would like the band, I just don't own their records.

People gather details and comparisons but it doesn't really bother me or land on me of any sort. I don't know if I was... Maybe I was influenced by them, maybe I wasn't, but I don't know. I was probably influenced by everything I've heard. So it doesn't bother me at all, but it doesn't sway me either.

Pitchfork: Who are other people that you get compared to?

JV: Neil Young, Sam Beam from Iron & Wine. Again, everyone that I know that listens to that, friends of mine... I haven't delved into his collection yet either. It's like Miles Davis. I haven't had my Miles Davis phase yet. You just gotta wait for your time. Maybe you get it, maybe you don't, but like I said, it doesn't bother me when people compare.

Pitchfork: How did you get your bandmates?

JV: Michael Noyce was a guitar student of mine for four years while he was in high school. For two years we'd play guitar then eventually we just started to listen to music. Started writing songs and he'd show me the songs. Eventually he just started coming over to my house and we'd just talk for hours. We did that for about four years. He graduated high school not long ago and went away to college. I called him after his first year and a half at college. I was like, "Check it out man, I think you would be perfect for this job."

And then Sean Carey, he's gigs around in Eau Claire. He's at the top of the jazz program at Wisconsin-Eau Claire. Basically he came up to me at my first show as Bon Iver, just like 40 people there, and I was playing guitar. He was like, "Dude, I know all your songs. I know how to play them and I know how to sing them" and I was like, "Whoa." So he came up and played three or four songs with me and just nailed it. Other than a few shows in New York, he's basically been with me since then.

Pitchfork: Before he approached you, did you think you were going to expand it or did you think it was always going to be just you?

JV: I didn't know. I was worried. One of the big problems was when I made the record, part of the reason why I thought I wasn't going to put it out was: How the fuck am I going to play these songs? How is it going to sound good? How am I going to find people I can trust?

And it's been a process of digging through the songs and trying to make them born on stage again. I think they are very different. I think they come off very differently. I think they come off, I don't know if it's masculine or outward, extroverted than introverted. I didn't know. It's just been a process. Like I said, I'm catching up. I'm satisfied with the show. I think I want to get better and better and keep building. It took a while to figure out how to do it. I didn't know how it was gonna go. I was just like, "I better book a show and just see what happens."

Pitchfork: When did you start introducing the sing-along?

JV: Right away, because I needed the voices. I needed that. So my first show I actually printed out lyric sheets to three or four of the songs. Eventually if we start headlining our own shows and I have some time, I want to do that at every show. Three or four of the songs.

People were singing "Flume". People were singing "The Wolves". I think it gave me confidence. I don't want to be the guy with an acoustic guitar singing songs, because that's boring for the most part. The song actually needs 80-500 people singing or whatever the vibe is of that room, it needs that fight. That song at the end is very destructive and chaotic and the song needs to be pushed up like that-- the sound from the people coming and the sound from stage. It needs that to happen.

Pitchfork: Have people gone on singing after "The Wolves" ends?

JV: Only once.

Pitchfork: It's going to happen more.

JV: Yeah, yeah. People sort of figure it out, that the song has broken apart. That's the story.

Pitchfork: But I could see people continuing on because they want it to keep going.

How did you come up with the name?

JV: When I was living up north I wrote a letter. I'd come across a story about this Alaskan town that the people, the first snow of every year, they come out of their houses and gather in town square. They hug and kiss each other and they say "Bon Iver." I was like, "whatever that is, that's cool!" So I would write it down. I signed off my letter as that to my friend Kelly from the Rosebuds. I wrote them a letter on my typewrite saying: "Thanks for letting me work on your record. Thanks for letting me crash at your house. Thanks for being friends." I signed off "Bon Iver."

After that I went down to North Carolina to go on tour with them. I played them the record and they were huge supporters of it. I was like, "I don't know what to do man. I don't know if this should be a band. I don't know if I should put this out. I've never been on a label. I've never toured. I don't know what the fuck's going on." She's like, "Dude, don't worry about it. Bon Iver-- that's your name." I was like, "alright, let's figure our what it means." I already knew what it meant to me-- it was whatever those people said to each other. Then I found out it was French and I was like, "Ohhh." I'm not French, I don't want to bastardize this whatever. Then I found out how it's spelled and it was sort of disappointing. I didn't like how it looked. It didn't have any emotion. Looking at it didn't make any sense. I wanted to look at it and feel something. It was sort of a compromise. I sorta wanted it to be like "Bon Iverre," sort of like how I saw it, but that didn't look good either, so I just decided to chop off the "h."

Pitchfork: Do people think that's your real name though?

JV: I totally get e-mails: "To Bon." I don't mind. I just want to make sure that people don't think that I expect them to address me as some other name than my own. I mean I don't mind if people say Bon Eye-ver or Bone-y-ver. It doesn't bother me. Whatever people end up saying that's fine.

Pitchfork: You don't strike me as the type of person that would be sick of it, but the cabin. I'm sure everybody talks about it.

JV: Everybody. That's the first question most ask.

Pitchfork: Are you thinking eventually in the future it's not going to be such a hot topic?

JV: Well, I don't know. Maybe. It makes sense that that's part of the story and everything, but that's part of any story of any record-- where was it record and how long and what were the people doing. I think people want to know where these events are made. That's why I like the word "record." I'm quoting Jackson Browne quoting Leonard Cohen, but it's a record of events. That's why they call it a record. And I like that because it's like it's what it is man-- it's a collection of songs, but it's not just the songs. Fleetwood Mac-- Rumours . Everyone was having sex with each other and doing cocaine-- a part of that made the record. I think that's an important part for people to understand-- the internal back story. But I'm over it. I just lived there [in the cabin]. It's not a big deal.

Pitchfork: You strike me as a visual person, and some of your songs seem cinematic, so that brings me to: What are your thoughts about licensing?

JV: I was talking to someone in L.A. about soundtracks and scoring. I love touring, I love making records, but eventually all I want...I want to score. I want people to ask me to score their film or use my songs in cinematic ways. I think the ultimate media is a story that you can watch and feel and have a musical moment to. I think it's my favorite. I love watching something when music is creating motion within the motion.

Licensing is how indie rock people make a living these days, so whatever about that. But I want good films and good placement for the songs because I want to be exclusive. I don't want to just sign it away because I don't want songs to lose meaning, but I'm also...I don't care [that] Wilco sold songs to Volkswagen. That's great. They probably drive Volkswagens.

Pitchfork: If you were scoring a film, would you be doing just music or would you be doing lyrical stuff too?

JV: Whatever it called for. It might be a song I would write for another voice-- a song for Dolly Parton, a boys choir, Merle Haggard. I get excited about the endless options, because when you're a rock band or you're an artist, you end up sounding like yourself. But I think making music for a scene opens so many more doors.

Pitchfork: Now this may be the most obvious question ever--

JV: --uh, huh. Good.

Pitchfork: So is Emma a real person, and is that her real name?

JV: Real person. real name. I won't divulge too much, but it's not a fake name. And it's not a fake person. I guess that's the best answer I can say: It's not a fake name and it's not a fake person. But it's not her real name and it's not a real person either.

Do you get what I'm saying? If it wasn't for this person's privacy, I'd be able to talk pretty freely about this subject on a personal level. The record's about not her. It's about my struggles through years of dealing with the aftermath of lost love and longing and just mediocrity and just bad news, like life stuff. And in the [record], where the title comes from, the lyrics are actually a conversation between me and another girl, not this Emma character.

Pitchfork: Is the person aware of it? What was their reaction?

JV: Nothing really changed. I explained to her what I explained to you: "This isn't about you-- as selfish as that sounds. It's about me. It's about all the shit that I dealt with and I didn't deal with."

But in any situation with long love, I don't think it ever really goes away fully. You just sort of learn where to keep it.

Pitchfork: Did this record help you find that place? Was it healing?

JV: It was the most cathartic experience of my entire life.

Pitchfork: Is there anything else that you want to talk about?

JV: Wow.

Pitchfork: Open mic-- music or anything else.

JV: I do think that our culture or our psyche as a country I guess, the world or whatever, we're due for a huge event. We're due for a little bit of a revolution or a spotlight or a movement. Something that feels large, something that feels like the 60s. Some sort of unification. I feel like this thing [that] we're rocking back and forth like we're stuck in a snow bank and we all sort of know it. I feel like people are getting less and less pretentious and less and less hip-- hopefully.

Pitchfork: Fingers crossed.

JV: More and more into natural feelings rather than convoluted feelings or tastemaking or what have you. You always need critique, rock critics, but you can't take away people's taste. People are starting to, very slowly, do their own thing.